At Raj Bhavan in Bombay, small stalks that you can see fallen on the ground
everywhere look just like the street lamps there. On a nature walk through
the grounds, a Bombay Natural History Society naturalist told me cheerfully
that these stalks belonged to the fruit of the "wild bhendi." It was a
terribly mundane explanation for the wonder I felt whenever I picked up one
of the stalks and looked bemusedly up at the street lamp, towering silently
above me. The naturalist didn't know it, but he had just pricked one of the
last few balloons of my childhood.

They're going fast, those balloons. But most of them are from the years at
Raj Bhavan. We lived in the estate two different times, which, I'll admit,
makes me feel distinctly privileged. Nothing else about my growing up years
was quite as special as Raj Bhavan.

The routine part, actually, is that Raj Bhavan is a unique part of Bombay.
It has lush vegetation, birds, butterflies, a beach and a spectacular view
of Marine Drive and the sea. Besides, it is -- or most of it is -- kept
spotlessly clean. And all those trees effectively keep out the noise and
the hustle and bustle of the Walkeshwar area. Indeed, of the rest of Bombay.
This is Bombay as it must have been a long time ago, before cars and trains
and garbage and dug up holes.

And yet, as I said, that's the routine part. Even without entering the
Governor's estate, you probably know he lives in a spectacular corner of
the city.

No, for me it was the far littler things that made Raj Bhavan special. And
if the BNHS naturalist unwittingly took away some of the charm in my
stalks, there is far more about Raj Bhavan that I remember fondly from when
I was a child. That he couldn't take away.

The littlest things were the tiny cylinders of plastic. In any random
handful of sand from the beach, there were always at least a few of these:
translucent, smooth, perhaps two millimetres long. While elder brother used
to collect small, funny crabs in his pockets when we were kids on the
beach, I gathered these. Because they were a constant puzzle. I never
understood where they came from and I never found them on other beaches.
But on that recent nature walk, I was thrilled to find them in the same
abundance.

If I looked up from my bhendi stalks at street lamps, kid sister was
looking up at drongos. We all had a passion for the ubiquitous little red
seeds. She specially liked the tinier egg-shaped ones with black caps. More
so because every time she found one, there was a jaunty drongo sitting
somewhere above, forked tail twitching merrily at her. It was the drongo
that was bringing her those seeds, she just knew.

The sea wall was always a delight. It was crumbling into a pile of rocks,
and pigeons sat on the rocks or nestled in nooks, cooing gently at us.
Races down the beach with Amma -- she usually won -- ended at the rocks.

We
would then pick our way over them and continue along the wall to the end of
the promontory, urged on by the pigeons. There, in pale marble, was an
enduring mystery. Three plaques, embedded in the rock face. "Me-Shoo: There
is not enough darkness in the world to put out the light of one small
candle." "Lindy Lou: Her tail still wags in our hearts." "Tilly, 1938 --
1942." A twinge of sadness would wend its way down my spine as we stood
there thinking about Lindy Lou and Me-Shoo and Tilly. For we too had dogs,
and my memories of Raj Bhavan are rarely without one or another of them.

It was the stuff of books I had read: the sand, the sea, the sun, a dog by
our side. Dumbo, an early and much loved doggy member of the family, was
truly that dog. Stories of Dumbo's clashes with cobras on the doorstep of
our Raj Bhavan house are still related with fondness and more than a little
respect. On the beach, he was tireless. He'd swim out with us to the boat,
strong and steady, swim back, chase a mongoose in the undergrowth, swim out
again.

Later, it was Milou, our snowy Samoyed. At the best of times, he wasn't a
big fan of water. One afternoon, I carried Milou out into the waves to make
him swim. He did fine for a few minutes, but suddenly began howling in a
ghastly fashion. I ran back to the beach with him. On dry ground, he limped
about for a few seconds, favouring a front paw. Then, a quick furtive look
in my direction, and he began tearing around the beach joyfully. Milou had
been pretending, only wanting to get out of the water!

But at least Milou recognized his lack of swimming talent. I didn't bother.
There was the time I leaped off a boat into several feet of water, somehow
unaware that I couldn't swim. Floundering and spluttering, I had to be
rescued by Amma. I did eventually learn to swim, but even today, she tells
the story through clenched teeth: "I was so ANGRY!"

And after hours of swimming -- or floundering -- and lazing in the sun,
there was always the treat of a shower. Cool and refreshing, yes. But it
offered another small source of wonder. The water that came out of those
showers was so fresh, it tasted almost sweet. It's a taste that's locked
away in my memories. It comes back sometimes with a pang, reminding me of
when I was three feet tall and not too many more years old. Today I know
that it was most of the day spent tasting the salt in the sea that made the
shower taste so sweet, not forgetting that the years have sweetened it some
more. But then it was something I looked forward to all day, that taste.

The sea wall at Raj Bhavan is still home to guttural pigeons, but it's no
longer crumbling. Now it has been repaired. The pile of rocks has gone. On
top, tarred and everything, is a regular boulevard. You can drive over in
your air conditioned Opel Astra to Me-Shoo's and Lindy Lou's plaques, if
the Governor will let you.

The short leafy path from the road down to the beach is now a grand tiled
staircase. And the beach itself, that gleaming, pristine stretch of sand?
Today, it is black with oil. And on that nature walk morning, it was inches
deep in the detritus of Bombay in the 1990s. Frooti boxes, thermocole, milk
cartons, condoms, an unbroken 60-watt bulb, plastic bags, pieces of glass.

I suppose that's all progress. Dumbo would have cut his paws on the glass.

Dilip D'Souza contributes a weekly column to Rediff On The NeT. D'Souza lived in a bungalow on the estate of the Raj Bhavan as a child for three to four years when his father, J B D'Souza, was the chief secretary of Maharashtra. Interestingly his father's successors opted not to live in the Raj Bhavan preferring more 'convenient' quarters elsewhere. The bungalow has been closed for 15 years or so after that. It is possible to take a nature walk through this beautiful estate if you contact Sanctuary, 60, Maker V, tel # 2830061.